Male C-suite executives in Australia are more likely to rate themselves as “highly proficient” in using generative AI at work than their female counterparts, despite female C-suites prioritising AI more.
A report from YouGov, commissioned by Salesforce, surveyed more than 280 C-suite executives in Australia in July this year on the importance of generative AI, how it’s used in the business context, how confident leaders are in using the technology, and more.
Almost all (99 per cent) survey respondents believed generative AI integration is important to the success of their business over the next three years, with 81 per cent saying it is at least in their top three priorities.
The research from YouGov and Salesforce found female C-suites were more likely to list generative AI as the top priority and is critical to the success of their business over the next three years. While 48 per cent of female C-suites responded this way, just 36 of their male counterparts did so.
Half (50 per cent) of female C-suites said they were using generative AI “all the time”, compared to 38 per cent of male C-suites.
Rowena Westphalen, the Senior Vice President of innovation, AI and customer advisory at Salesforce, said these results show an improvement from Salesforce’s last report six months earlier, in women’s adoption of generative AI in the business context.
“When I first saw the stats specifically related to gender, I felt happy,” Westphalen said.
“Women were quite far behind in adopting generative AI compared to men… so I was happy there was an improvement.”
As the lead of AI in Salesforce who has worked in AI and tech for many years, Westphalen uses generative AI every day – both at work, and at home.
“We imagine these things in the future,” Westphalen told Women’s Agenda, “but they’re actually already here.”
However, when it comes to proficiency, female C-suites are less likely than male C-suites to rate their skills in using generative AI highly.
More than half (54 per cent) of male C-suites rated themselves as “highly proficient” in using generative AI to complete work tasks. This is compared to 37 per cent of female C-suites. The majority of female C-suites who responded to the survey rated themselves as “somewhat proficient”.
Despite being proficient and comfortable in using AI herself, Westphalen recognises the gender gap in “confidence” when it comes to C-suite executives introducing generative AI to the business. Westphalen said it is largely a “societal” issue.
“You don’t want to paint with too broad a brush, but sometimes women don’t express their competence and confidence as highly as men,” Westphalen said.
“I think women are brought up to be ‘good girls’… to not put themselves forward too much, to be humble.”
While female C-suites weren’t as likely to rate their skills in generative AI highly, more than half (54 per cent) of respondents reported their teams’ proficiency in using generative AI as “highly proficient”, similar to that of male C-suites (53 per cent).
Generative AI’s role in promoting inclusive content and communication emerged as the most prevalent use amongst C-suite executives, noted by 35 per cent of respondents, and is expected to remain significant both now and over the next three years (37 per cent).
However, the primary obstacle to adoption, alongside the issue of generating inaccurate outputs, is the lack of accessibility and inclusivity in generative AI tools (31 per cent).